


we won't stop burning 'till we reach the sun

by sleepylouis



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Based off a song, M/M, i literally woke up and wrote this, idk - Freeform, pls, what to tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-09
Updated: 2014-01-09
Packaged: 2018-01-08 01:42:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1126887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepylouis/pseuds/sleepylouis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>louis likes a certain garden and a certain boy with green eyes.</p><p>(or the one where louis was in a car accident and he finds more than a cure at his recovery center.)</p><p>loosely based off "featherstone" by the paper kites</p>
            </blockquote>





	we won't stop burning 'till we reach the sun

**Author's Note:**

> dedicated to my lovely lexi loo because she always talks about how she reads fics and i decided to give her one i love you bubs
> 
> ps excuse any errors i'll catch them maybe probably not

louis isn't normal.

 

he never has been, and the doctors tell him he never will be. the area of his brain damaged in the drunk driving accident when he was sixteen ruined him mentally. no cure. no fix. no miracle recovery.

 

louis lost everything.

 

there are a lot of silly little things he can't do anymore, like write legibly or feed himself. they say his fine motor skills will return in time, but for now louis is reliant on everyone to do basic tasks, and he absolutely hates it. when pretty nurses with the smiling faces come in to help him dress, louis avoids their eyes and all the while thinks how much better it would've been if his brain would've quit the fight before he did.

 

and then there are the bigger things louis can't do, like find his way around places or recognize the faces of his family. he's forgotten his mum seven times this week alone. the doctors assure  him he's getting better. louis isn't sure.

 

it's a lonely world when everyone in it is unrecognizable to louis.

 

the nurses give him all kinds to tips to remember his family, like identifying them by height and hair style. they each wear a different color pin which corresponds to the name table by louis' bed. they try to help him, they really do. but it's not the same.

 

life never will be, really. louis isn't _louis_ anymore, so how could it ever feel normal? he used to wake up in his flat with his best mate liam. he used to go out and party and drink and shag random guys and sleep with no regrets on his mind. now louis wakes up among sterile white sheets with a mind so fucked up he doesn't even know who his own _mum_ is.

 

six months is a long time to wait for a recovery. it's pretty evident by this point that louis will never be well again, despite the vigorous therapy and the medication. he's young enough to regain some mobility because of brain plasticity but old enough to lose enough of himself.

 

as much as louis doesn't admit it, this whole thing hurts him. _depressing_. he wants to run away. he wants to escape. he wants to be healthy again.

 

so louis hides.

 

he finds himself in closets frequently cocooned in silk wrappings like a caterpillar ready to bloom. he'll sit there for hours and stare at his body--his arms, his legs, his fingers and toes--and wonder _how did they stop working?_ he begs them to move again, to make it all right, but he isn't okay, he never will be. louis' injuries go deeper than skin level.

 

sometimes he sees the accident.

 

he'll be sleeping and his dreams will erupt in a burst of metal and screeching and broken limbs. he hears the screams of the people in the car, he feels the white-hot pain streaking through his ribs, his head, his left leg. he tastes the metallic blood, sharp and distinct in his mouth.

 

he wakes up screaming and sweating with tears tracking down his cheeks and anxiety rippling through his mind. nurses rush in and put him under and everything is blissfully black again.

 

people say louis is lucky to be alive. he isn't so sure.

 

-

 

 

there's only one place on this whole campus that louis actually _likes._

it's a little fenced-off area outside the rehabilitation wing that once used to be a patio. since it hasn't been occupied in nearly three years, it's overgrown with weeds and broken gnomes scatter the waist-high grass. it's small and enclosed and rather shady but there isn't a nurse to be found there and louis decides it's _his_ place.

 

from two o'clock to four o'clock every day, you can find louis tomlinson curled among the weeds, impossibly small against the tall grass. he sits and stares at the blue sky and aches to be free from this prison of both his mind and body and waits for something to take him away from here except no one does and he's _trapped._ louis has been waiting for six months.

 

except in the fall of his twenty-second birthday, he isn't alone anymore.

 

_green eyes. curly hair. lanky limbs. pale skin. plump lips._

 

the kid follows louis out of his secret door to the garden one day and louis doesn't know _what_ to do--louis doesn't want _his_ place to become _their_ place but he doesn't know what to say. the boy lays with louis in the weeds and stares at the sky and wishes he was free too and they never speak a word.

 

louis wonders if he knows this boy, or if his mind is playing tricks on him. wouldn't really be a big surprise, really, if his name had slipped louis' mind. but somehow louis doesn't think he would forget a set of dazzling green eyes like that. doesn't _feel_ right.

 

on the fifth day he follows louis out, louis decides the garden needs an extra person to feel less lonely. the kid _fits_ with the rest of them--louis doesn't understand how to explain it. _it just works_.

 

"ours," louis says quietly before he gets up to leave for rehabilitation therapy. " _ours."_

the boy's eyes grow impossibly large and bright. a smile breaks across his face--the type of smile that makes louis forget how to breathe for a minute. he wants to say something else, but he seems to forget how to use his voice.

_louis isn't alone anymore. he never is._

 

it's kind of a routine now, coming out and finding the lanky-limbed kid with eyes too big and lips more sinful than the devil. louis finds him and sits down and they stare at the trashyard of a patio until louis' nurses come fetch him for physical therapy. no words. no exchanged gazes. just utter silence and the warm feeling of not being _alone._

louis hasn’t ever had anyone he would consider a friend, but this kid kind of qualifies, he thinks. makes him feel less lonely, and provides some sort of comfort. louis tells harry everything, and harry listens to his life story and stays silent, offers nothing in return, and louis decides harry is definitely his friend.

 

(except louis isn’t sure if the warm, shifting feeling in his stomach exactly fits under the friend category but _whatever,_ harry is pretty and louis is just a man with an eye for beauty.)

today is different though--today is not the same.

 

the boy is there and louis is there but the boy is staring at louis and he's _crying_ and louis isn't sure what to do. he doesn't comfort people and he doesn't know how--since the accident, _he's_ the one whose gotten the pity.

 

louis slides closer to him, the dry weeds crackling. it's uncomfortable and awkward, but louis  wraps his arms around his broad shoulders and pulls him closer to his chest. the boy doesn't protest. he just rests against louis' heartbeat and sniffles into his shirt and all the while louis thinks how nice it is to have someone to hold again.

 

and so the boy becomes his daily routine.

 

he isn't easy to forget, with those dazzling green eyes. he's made to be _remembered,_ louis thinks, because no one was given that sort of beauty just to be forgotten. not even an accident and a damaged frontal lobe could steal that from louis.

 

louis holds him tighter and begs himself— _let him stay._

 

 

-

 

_his name is harry._

 

the boy doesn't say it--he doesn't say anything, really--but he wears this name tag in pretty, loopy writing with _harry_ on the front. louis decides he likes the name. he likes harry. he likes his green eyes.

_he likes the way harry refuses to be forgotten._

 

it's different these days, in the patio with harry. they lose themselves in the tall weeds, bodies intertwined and eyes locked on each other. louis tells harry things, he tells harry about beautiful things and wonderful places and extraordinary adventures and harry listens eagerly, like he's in one of louis' tales.

 

sometimes louis will reach forward and touch harry ever so gently. he’ll caress his face and harry watches him, his breathing hitched and his eyes wide. louis thinks harry is like porcelain—fragile and already broken. the sort of crack you can’t see from the pretty, gleaming surface.

 

he doesn’t know what’s wrong with harry but he still thinks he’s beautiful.

 

louis kisses harry, he kisses him soft and slow and sweet so he knows just how wonderful he is and harry always kisses him back and louis knows they’re definitely not friends anymore. harry is too pretty to just observe, louis thinks, and he wonders if harry knows that himself.

 

so he kisses harry again and again and again and again and each time he feels a little part of himself drift away and attach itself to harry.

 

louis doesn’t know what love is. louis doesn’t know what he is with harry.

 

but louis is _happy._

_-_

_louis tells harry he wants to live **.**_

he tugs on harry's too-large hands and tells him to run away with him. they could escape to the seaside and hide in the cave by the ocean and watch the tides roll in. they could feel the light wind in their hair and taste the salt in the breeze and feel the water lapping at their ankles. louis hasn't seen the sea since his accident, and his little bracelet marked _mental_ stops him from trying.

 

harry looks scared--he always does--but he nods slowly.

 

harry would do anything for louis, he always tries at speech therapy so he can _tell_ louis how much he means to him, but his brain doesn't cooperate. louis doesn't know yet about his injury yet. harry doesn't know how to tell him.

 

harry listens as louis lays out a plan to escape during breakfast.

 

it's detailed and risky--they'll surely get caught and their outside privileges will be taken away--but louis has this look in his eyes, this _excitement_ harry has never seen before and really, who is he to say no?

 

they run away.

 

they do it and it's scary and exhilarating and louis is throwing his head back, laughing, _laughing, laughing_ and harry thinks he's tremendously, overwhelmingly _beautiful._

the sea is cold and grey and capped in white. it roars onshore with bellowing force and crashes into the rocks and sprays everywhere and does it _again and again and again_. harry is transfixed by the sea. louis is in love with it. harry is in love with louis.

 

maybe louis is a child of the sea or something because he looks so _alive_ here. harry could sit on the beach for hours and watch the way louis runs through the shallow water and skips stones and dives under the wave's surface. he'll pop back up just as harry begins to get worried with hair plastered to his face and cheeks flushed with the thrill and the cold.

 

his eyes-- _god, his eyes_ \--look like the very ocean themselves.

 

it's hours before louis finally runs onshore and pulls harry into the water. it's freezing, so cold that it physically _hurts._ harry is gasping for air, struggling against the weight of the sea and then louis is right there and he's _kissing_ him, he's breathing air into harry's burning lungs. louis tastes like saltwater and sadness and harry wants to drift away under the waves with louis next to him and never go back on land.

 

darkness falls soon. sunset streaks across the sky like a spilled palette, a bleeding array of wonderful colors. louis lays on the beach with harry curled on his chest and watches, just _sees_ and thinks how lovely this whole thing is. harry is lovely and the sea is lovely and the sky is lovely and he doesn't ever want to leave.

 

louis can hear sirens not far off and he knows they're coming to take him back and lock him up again and yeah, he's going to be in _so_ much trouble, but he feels alive for the first time in six months and there's a pretty boy sleeping on his chest and he can't bring himself to care.

 

louis runs his hands across harry’s face and sighs deeply. his eyelashes fawn across his pale cheeks gently, casting shadows. louis can see veins beneath his ivory skin--they're like ethereal purple pathways, webbing their way to harry's heart.

 

and then there's his lips--louis thinks you could write a whole book of poetry about his lips. they're pink and supple and lovely and so very harry-like. his lips are the type that beg for soft morning kisses, yet give the illusion of sex.

 

louis traces the bow of harry's lips and the arch of his nose and the curve of his eyes. his fingers glide down the angle of his cheekbone all the way to the sharp linear plane of his jawline. harry stirs out of sleep slowly and finally blinks awake to look at louis.

 

"morning pretty boy," louis whispers, planting a kiss on his forehead. the sirens are so close now--louis can hear voices and the slamming of car doors and now there are flashlights shining on their old footprints in the sand.

 

_"hey I got something here tom!"_

 

harry makes a move to peek out from louis' chest and see what's happening. louis doesn't let him. he just keeps running his hands through the soft curls and harry sighs in contentment.

 

_"tom, I got them!"_

 

-

 

winter is cold and long and insufferably the same.

 

his family stops visiting as often because they have lives that don't include nursing a man who doesn't even know them half the time. the nurses explain to louis in soft voices how this is emotionally draining for them, and they need their space-- _but don't worry, they still love you!_ louis doesn't understand how they could take his sickness and turn it into their problem but whatever, fine, _all right._

 he has harry. harry understands.

 

since the adventure at sea, the two of them are strictly banned from leaving their floor without supervision and _yeah_ it sucks, but the nurses have a soft spot when it comes to louis and harry. they'll sneak the two of them out to the patio at least once a week if their witch of a supervisor isn't around because they're like the _thing_ among the staff. star crossed lovers or something. _all right, whatever._

along with the change in seasons, there's been a change in louis' condition.

 

he can now dress himself, and at dinner he holds his own spoon. his team of doctors are so _so_ proud ( _louis, we knew you'd do it!)_ but harry can't quite meet his eyes anymore. they both know what this means--louis is getting _better._ he's healing. and healthy people don't stay here.

 

louis tries telling harry that he'll visit when he gets released, he promises he'll take harry to the beach or ice cream or the fucking _moon_ if he wanted because who is louis to deny those green eyes anything? harry doesn't reply. he never does.

 

he stops visiting louis' room as often.

 

louis feels terrible about getting better and that's not how it should be. harry should be happy that he's healing, not making louis feel guilty for something he can't help. louis knows he has full right to be angry at harry for his immaturity but he simply _can't._

the nurses tell louis he'll be out by spring and louis fakes a smile and harry doesn't meet his eyes.

 

louis curls up with harry and cries and cries and apologizes for getting better and harry can’t quite swallow the lump on his throat. he pushes louis’ hair off his forehead and peppers his face in kisses and tries to tell him all the things he’ll never be able to. he wants to tell louis that it isn’t his fault, that he’s happy louis is going to leave (kind of) but he’s sick and he _can’t._

once louis leaves, he’ll go into the world and find someone lovely to grow old with and he’ll never remember harry and that’s okay, it really is. harry isn’t meant to be loved by anyone. his own family doesn’t even love him—they make that fact quite clear. harry doesn’t have anyone.

 

( _harry doesn’t know he has louis.)_

spring comes in a haze of rain and color.

 

louis has a big party celebrating his release and he’s bright and glowing and harry’s chest aches because he’s far too fond of him to say goodbye. he writes louis a big long letter telling him how he’ll fix up the garden for him when he’s gone and how he’ll give the nursing staff hell for both of them. louis is a crying mess by time he reaches the end, and he hugs harry so tightly he has to pry louis off so he can breathe.

 

(maybe there are some goodbye kisses, but harry and louis make those farewells elsewhere.)

 

louis’ family shakes harry’s hand and his sisters all adore his hair and harry laughs at their excitement. louis can’t help but think how natural the whole thing looks, and apparently his mum thinks the same thing because she tells louis he’s a lovely lad.

 

louis ends up buying a flat within walking distance of the rehabilitation center, and he visits every day after work. he always brings harry some sort of flowers—his room is practically a garden by now—and harry is so in love with him he can’t see straight. louis sometimes stays the night in harry’s room and technically he isn’t supposed to, but the staff love him and they can never say no.

 

it’s been a year since his accident and louis’ prognosis is great. he’s recovered all his motor skills, and although he still has trouble with remembering faces, he’s gotten good at remembering them by other things.

 

he feels almost normal again.

 

except now louis has harry and harry is everything but normal. louis doesn’t know exactly when he fell in love with him, but he knows he can’t imagine living without those green eyes and messy curls and he tells harry all the time— _I love you, babe—_ and harry still hasn’t said a thing.

 

by now, louis knows harry will probably never say a thing to him, and that’s okay—harry has a dry-erase board he uses to talk, and if louis tricks himself well enough, he can picture what harry’s voice would sound like saying the three words he’s only been able to write.

 

it’s summertime and harry is tan and beautiful and louis is in love with being in love.

 

the rehabilitation center begins to allow louis to take harry home with him on holidays and at first it’s scary because louis has so many meds to give to harry at specific times and he has to constantly watch him and louis is so afraid of messing up. harry kisses him fiercely and writes out “ _you’re not going to hurt me, lou”_ and louis tries to relax and it sort of works. _sort of._

 

(louis also takes harry to the beach and they end up having sex for the first time there on the sand. it’s messy and unskilled but louis still falls asleep with harry curled into his chest and his body feeling like liquid gold.)

 

on the eve of august, harry’s nursing staff calls louis with the best news he’s heard all year.

 

harry’s release date is scheduled for the fourth of september and louis is over the fucking _moon—_ he calls his mum in practical tears and she’s laughing happily and everything is _wonderful._ louis feels like a balloon and harry tells him to stop being so excited or there won’t be any excitement left for him.

 

so the next month is spent turning a one-person flat into a two-person flat. louis tries really hard to make his shitty house good enough for harry because up until then he’d been doing an awful job of keeping it up to living conditions. he cleans it from top to bottom and buys new decorations and spends hours making housewarming signs for harry and it’s all silly but he feels _proud_ of himself.

 

-

on august twenty-first, harry speaks his first words in three years.

 

louis is at the rehabilitation center with harry, curled on the bed and they’re watching _the princess bride._ they’re at the part where inigo says “ _hello, my name is inigo montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die!”_ and louis is getting so fucking excited because he _loves_ this movie when—

 

“i—i’m ha… harry.”

 

the words are so heavily slurred and clouted with stammer that louis doesn’t know what he says at first but that doesn’t matter because harry said _something._ louis squeals and throws his arms around harry’s neck and kisses his hair, his cheeks, his lips, and harry laughs sheepishly at the whole thing.

 

it’s a start though.

 

harry practices that phrase until he can say it with minimal slurring and louis is just so fucking _proud_ he practically preens. he showers harry in praise and kisses and that’s really okay with harry; he’ll take that.

 

the day of harry’s coming home dawns in a flurry of stress for louis. he wakes up at five-thirty in the morning just to make sure everything is in order for his arrival. he’s made dinner for the two of them, hung up a banister with the words “ _welcome home, harry!”_ painted across it in louis’ terrible handwriting and decorated the place in streamers and glitter. maybe the glitter was overkill but _whatever,_ harry’s going to be _his_ full-time now and it has to be _perfect._

harry is the vision of glory when he walks out to louis’ car, his bags slung over his shoulders and his hair tousled from the wind. he looks healthy and happy and ready to leave and louis is so _happy_ he could cry.

 

(he actually does cry, but louis wipes away the tears quickly so that doesn’t count, right?)

 

and when harry sees the house, sees all the effort louis put in to making it comfortable, _he_ starts crying and now louis can’t help but cry if harry does. they’re both sniveling messes before they cross the doorstep but that’s okay because this is their home and they’re allowed to be emotional.

 

“we’re gonna make so many memories in here,” louis gives harry a watery smile and fuck, harry is beautiful as he nods and kisses louis. he kisses louis hard and merciless and doesn’t let go. louis doesn’t want him to anyway.

 

so they eat dinner and harry does his speaking exercises and louis listens to his lovely voice and gives him encouragement the whole time. harry is painfully self conscious about his speech because it’s so slurred and tangled, and he often tries to get louis not to listen—but louis kisses him and tells him that he's wonderful.

 

night falls and they’re curled together on the bed. they’ve just had their first shag in the house and louis feels like liquid stars and molten moondust. he’s so fucked-out and tired he barely has energy to raise his chin enough to kiss harry slowly, but he does and harry doesn’t let him go.

 

“i love you,” louis whispers into the darkness, thumbing harry’s sweat-sheened cheeks. “i love you so fucking much, harry. you know, sometimes i’m glad i got into that accident, as fucked-up as it sounds.”

 

he doesn’t expect a reply—he never does—but just as he falls asleep, he gets one.

 

the voice is cracked and worn. the effort it takes to produce the three words is evident, but they come our clear enough and louis swears he forgets to breathe.

 

_“i… i love you too, louis.”_


End file.
